When You Look
by Hippielover459
Summary: However, Jamie is not the same girl you knew; an annoying little voice reminded him.


Notes: Dude, I just watched the Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince trailer. That has nothing to do with this story, just wanted to put it out there. I've been a little sad lately and today I was watching Read It and Weep and decided Jamie was going to be sad with me. Yes, I know they both seem to be going a little overboard, but I wrote it that way for a reason. Don't be hating. Ignore the mistakes and enjoy!  
Warning: Depressing Thoughts  
Summary: _However, Jamie is not the same girl you knew; _an annoying little voice reminded him.  
Disclaimer: I don't own _Read It and Weep_ or the song _Skin by Alexz Johnson_ or anything else mentioned you recognize. But if I could own anything, it would be Jason Dolley.  
Reminder: Please review!

* * *

It was weeks, it was months, since she apologized to everyone, in front of the entire school, at the Deep Blue Sea Dance. Nothing had changed. People still hated her for what she wrote. Nevertheless, after a few months, even the person who hated Jamie Bartlett the most, Sawyer Sullivan, could see what was happening.

Jamie Bartlett went from a happy, smiling girl who loved bright colors and fun outfits to a sad, frowning blob who stopped caring about her looks.

After a while, her old friends, Lindsay and Harmony and Connor tried to talk to her, after realizing what was happening, after realizing what Jamie had done, was all a mistake.

"Hi Jamie," Connor said as she walked past the three of them early one morning on her way to Homeroom.

Jamie looked up for a brief second to see who had said her name, to see who had said it without sarcasm tacked on to the end of it. Seeing all of her old friends, tears immediately came to her eyes and she hurried away, leaving three very confused teenagers behind her. Connor's heart felt as if it had jumped from a very tall building and landed on some spikes, for he had been in love with Jamie for years and hated himself for ignoring her for so long. Connor shared a fearful look with both Harmony and Lindsay, but the bell rang before they could do anything. It would have to wait until after Homeroom.

Jamie walked in late to English, which the others thought strange, seeing as Jamie's Homeroom was her English classroom. If somebody had looked close enough, they would have noticed the tearstains on her face and the drop of blood on her jeans. But of course, nobody noticed. Nobody ever noticed. Especially to the girl that had betrayed them all in a national bestselling book that people everywhere had read.

At lunch, Connor tried again to talk to Jamie. He found her just before she left the cafeteria.

"Jamie-"

She turned around at the sound of her name. Her eyes glanced away when she saw it was Connor, the boy no more than three months ago was the boy she had loved more than anything else in the world. Fearing he was going to harass her like everybody else did, she slid her headphones on, while whispering, "Please Connor, just leave me alone."

She turned and started to walk away. She was halfway to the nearest girls' restroom when Connor hurried to catch up. The volume was turned up loud and he could hear:

_I drift away to a place  
Another kind of life  
Take away the pain  
I create my paradise  
__Everything I've held  
Has hit the wall  
What used to be yours  
Isn't yours at all  
__Falling apart, and all that I'm asking  
Is it a crime, am I overreacting-_

He grabbed Jamie's arm and pulled her to a stop.

"Just leave me alone," she repeated, pulling her headphones down around her neck.

"You're scaring me," he confessed.

Jamie shook her head. "You are the biggest liar I've ever met. You don't care about me."

"Jamie-"

"No!" Jamie shouted. "You've had you say. You have had plenty of time to talk, so now it is my turn. I have been quiet for so long, there are so many things I have wanted to say to you, to Lindsay and Harmony, to the entire school. Do you know how hard it was for me to come back here the day after the entire student body rejected my apology to my face? Did you know my mother almost checked me into the hospital on a Suicide Watch? Did you know that every time I walk into a room, people walk out; even my own brother does it! My parents have lost a ton of money because I refuse to write anymore, I will not even pick up a book. I hate everything with a passion you will _never_ understand. Not like you would even understand because your life is going just fine. You cannot take it all away. You cannot make time rewind to before I made that stupid mistake. You cannot make everything better by trying to pretend it never happened. It is too late for you to just step up and make everything okay. Do you understand me? It is too late! There is nothing you or anybody else can do about it. I'm sick and tired of people, I'm sick and tired of trying, and I'm sick and tired of pretending I'm okay when I'm not!" With that, Jamie put her headphones back on, the song blaring from the earpieces, and walked away.

What she had said scared Connor more then anything else he could think of. Suicide Watch? No more writing and reading? Sick and tired of trying? Things were crossing his mind that he never thought Jamie Bartlett would think of herself. Jamie was not a stupid girl, he tried reminding himself.

_However, Jamie is not the same girl you knew; _an annoying little voice reminded him.

Connor talked to Lindsay and Harmony about what Jamie had said, but they figured after a while Jamie would return to her old self. Connor hoped they were right, but the annoying little voice would not go away.

After school that day, Jamie watched her dad drive away with her brother in the front seat. Tears came to her eyes. She missed what little relationship her and Lenny once had. Her parents were constantly trying to patch the hole between them, but nothing worked.

Later that night, Lenny was out with his friends and their parents were still at the pizza parlor. Jamie thought back to the people she knew, the people that had once been her friends, and the people that had once been her best friends. _Nobody will care;_ a voice told her that sounded nothing like her own. _Everything will be better. You will not be sad or lonely anymore. You are brave and you can do this._

Jamie listened to the voice. She locked her bedroom door and walked into her bathroom, locking that door also. She knew what she would do, she pulled out old painkillers that had oddly been left and she downed them, three at a time. She wanted everything to be easy. She laid down, cold bathroom floor feeling hard beneath her. She wanted the fear and the _guilt _and the _anger _and the hate and the sadness and the confusion and the _shame _and the _longing _and the cruelty and the _pain _and the despair and the _anxiety _to just be gone, forever.

And it was.

The next morning, people who once stared at Jamie in disgust and anger now looked ashamed, guilty, lost, sad and upset. There was a picture of Jamie Bartlett (back when she was happy) on the front page of the local newspaper, and the headline just above it simply said:

**Jamie Bartlett, Age 16, Author of **_**Is Saves the World**_**, Committed Suicide Late Last Night.**

And the morning after that, there was a new front-page story. There was a little letter on this page that only said, _"For the girl I have always loved, for the girl I will follow anywhere, this is for you. I have only wanted to be with you, and now I will be. I hope you will accept me with open arms for I am making the ultimate sacrifice for you. This is for you, Jamie Bartlett."_

Just beside that was a picture of Connor Kennedy (his smile making the page glow) and the headline above both was simply:

**Connor Kennedy, Age 16, Was Found Dead Late Last Night, Gripping Love Letter to Recently Deceased Author Jamie Bartlett.**


End file.
